Will You Love Me Always?
by Speck
Summary: (SECOND STAGE ENDING SPOILERS!) The men have left for Tarak, under Jura's strict orders to bring back good men... where does this leave Barnette? Jura/Barnette fluff...


Will You Love Me Always?

By Speck 

**_DISCLAIMER: All characters, names and related materials copyright to and property of GONZO, Media Factory and Pioneer. I've only fictionalized parts of it, I promise, you guys. _**

**_AUTHOR'S QUICKNOTE: This takes place AFTER the ending of the Second Stage of Vandread, so if you haven't seen it yet, I strongly suggest you either A) do so, or B) stop reading now. If you continue on, you do so at your own risk. Please don't read it and then complain to me that I spoiled it for you… that's all that I ask. Or, you could be like me and want to read it regardless of spoilers. In that case, sit back and relax… I'll try to sate your curiosities. :D Also note that I might not be right on-target with some things; please, older veterans of Vandread, don't hold it against me. I apologize in advance for any miscalculations I might make._**

"And make sure you call me every day," Jura stated matter-of-factly, gazing down at the three men she'd come to know and appreciate for the past ten months. Hibiki's eyes dulled over.

"All right, all right, we'll call… jeez… can we go now?" he muttered. Jura's eyes suddenly clouded over in tears. She spread her arms wide, taking a few steps forward.

"I just… I… please bring back someone nice!" she sobbed, latching her arms around Bart and Duero, while Hibiki looked on. Barnette leaned over.

"She's just looking for someone to make a baby with," she whispered to Hibiki. He glanced up, curiosity crossing over his face.

"What? Not you?"

Barnette felt that familiar pain stab, once again, through her heart. Quietly, almost to herself, she spoke.

"No, I guess not. But it's her decision. I only want her to be happy."

Hibiki blinked a few times at Barnette, and he could've sworn he'd seen a glimmer of tears at the edge of her eyes.

"Come on! We're past the launch time!" B.C. called from the entrance of the transport ship that was to carry the men back to Tarak, where they would pick a group of men to come and live with women aboard the now famous Nirvana, a sort of government sanctioned experiment to see how the two genders, after decades of separation, would fare with each other. As Hibiki made his way up the gangplank, Misty jumped in front of him.

"Wait just a minute!" she commanded. "Dita has a favor she wants to ask of you."

Hibiki turned in his tracks. "I don't have time to go see your room now…"

"N-no… that's not it…"

"Then what?"

Dita twined her fingers together, gazing down at her clamped hands. "Well… I, uh… could you say my name one last time before you leave?"

Hibiki's face bloomed into a deep crimson blush. "I, well… I, um…" He became aware that he was being stared down on all four sides by Meia, Barnette, Paiway, and Misty's "pet", Q-Chan.

"I… I can't do that right now! I mean, come on… I… now you've gotten me all embarrassed…"

"Hibiki!" B.C. barked. "We have to go now!"

"R-right…" Hibiki turned his gaze back on Dita. He bit his lip, as she looked close to bursting into tears.

"I… I'm sorry, I've gotta go now. See you later."

Myriad thoughts poured through his mind as he paced up the gangplank, each step seeming to be held down by the azure blue stare of her eyes. As he boarded the transport, he let one foot hang back until the gangplank began pulling away. Some inner voice of his, one that had been cultivated over the past ten months, burst out.

"DITA!"

Dita blinked, sniffing gently, and turned at the sound of his voice. He stood at the entry of the ship, his hand extended, a smile upon his handsome face.

"Come on! You're coming with us!"

At first, she couldn't believe her ears. But when he remained standing at the entryway, his hand still reaching out to her, she felt her feet propel into motion, sending her careening up the retreating gangplank. With a sudden push of her feet against the edge of the gangplank she was airborne, her hand reaching out to his… that last clasp, and she was aboard.

Smiling and happy, the rest of the Nirvana's crew waved as the transport gunned into motion and away from the spaceport. As soon as it was gone, the rest of the crew dispersed into the docked Nirvana. Jura leaned in close to Barnette, and whispered into her ear.

"One month's worth of cooking says Dita comes back pregnant with his kid. If I'm right, you cook…"

Barnette chuckled. "You're on."

~~~~~

That night, down in the bio-park of the Nirvana, Jura sat herself at the end of a park bench, gazing out into space. She huffed gently to herself.

"They still haven't called," she muttered sullenly, fingering the edge of her neckband. "Oh, they'll have it in for sure if they show up with a bunch of nasty, ugly hooligans… I'll spit Hibiki and roast him!"

"Temper, temper, Jura," Barnette called teasingly, walking down the sidewalk to the park bench. She seated herself next to Jura, who scooted over, allowing her room to sit.

"So, have you been waiting out here all this time for them to call?"

"Yes I have! And let me tell you, they're thirty minutes late! I swear, they'd better bring back some men with a lot better senses of time and loyalty!"

Barnette gazed down at the tips of her boots. "So… who do you think you'll be looking for?"

"Oh, I dunno," Jura sighed, crossing her arms behind her head and gazing up to the stars. "I guess a nice-looking guy… maybe like Duero, but with lighter hair and a nicer disposition… what about you? Who would you look for?"

Barnette let a strained laugh escape her throat. "I… I don't think I'll be looking for anybody…"

"Really?"

"Really… because… because I already love somebody… even though I know I've been terrible and never really there for that person… and already, she's forgotten me…"

Jura felt her eyes widen. "Barnette… are you…"

"Talking about you?" she replied, turning her eyes upon Jura. "Yes. I never really let it bother me before, but then you started getting so serious about it... about getting together with someone else to have a baby… I… I realized how lonely you must have felt… after I left the Dread squad to take over for Gascogne… how much I changed. I guess I let her mannerisms take over my personality… I started acting more aloof and mature… like I was in control of myself… but I wasn't. I was putting on a façade. I didn't want you to see how much I hurt… it hurt, you know? I caused you to pull away so much that… that you didn't want to be with me anymore. That you wanted to have a baby with someone else. Knowing that tortured me more than anything. But…" she paused. "I understand. I know I was always busy with the Reg crew, but that's no excuse. I shouldn't have turned away so much. But… I've loved you for so long… and no matter what, I always will. I guess… all I want is for you to be happy. Seeing you happy makes the stars twinkle just a little more brightly for me, you know? So… find that guy, okay? For me? And have a happy family…"

Stiffly, Barnette stood from the bench. Jura, in complete shock from her words, could only mumble numbly.

"B… Barnette, wait… what…"

The green-haired woman turned, smiling, tears running down her cheeks. "It's all right… I won't bother you any more. But you'll always have a special place in my heart, Jura Basil Elden. You're the only woman to ever love me, as much as I loved you. I'm sorry I was so foolish as to throw that love away. Now you can find happiness that will be everlasting… goodbye, Jura…"

Without a second glance she turned her back, and paced away, leaving Jura to lean limply back into the park bench. In the most inopportune of times a video-link window popped up, displaying Hibiki's face.

"Do you know how long it took me to hunt you down?" he chided. "Anyway, we've made it, and so far we're keeping to your standards… we've got a few decent guys here… you wanna take a look?"

"…way… alone…"

"What? Wha'd ya say? Stop mumbling and look up here!"

Hibiki recoiled in shock as Jura glared back at him, tears wetting most of her face.

"I said go away and leave me the hell alone!" she nearly screamed, standing up and storming away from the park bench to her quarters. Hibiki scratched his head in confusion.

"What… what did I say?"

~~~~~

It was dark and empty in the little kitchen that served as the break room for the crewmembers aboard the ship. Lucky for Barnette. She dug through the storage shelves until she found a few small flasks of a sweet tasting alcoholic drink. Uncapping one, she sat at the wet bar, sipping at it. At first sip it burned, but on subsequent hits of the flask, she began to feel numb. It didn't matter, anyway… perhaps she would take all the flasks and drink until she passed out…

"Hush now, Kahlua… shh, it's all right, love… here, we'll get you your baa and everything will be all right…"

Barnette glanced over her shoulder as Rebecca approached, cradling a crying Kahlua in her arms. Rebecca flicked on a light, and noticed Barnette sitting at the bar.

"Hey, what brings you here?" she asked, digging through the refrigerator until she found Kahlua's "baa". She uncapped it and set it in a nearby microwave, timing it to warm the contents to room temperature. Barnette nursed at the open flask.

"Just drowning my sorrows, I guess," she said simply, downing the rest of the drink in a gulp. She reached down into the storage shelf and grabbed another flask.

"Wow… it must've been bad if you're drinking two of those things… I can't even hold one," Rebecca joked, removing the now-warmed bottle from the microwave and recapping it. Nestling Kahlua in the crook of her arm, she offered forward the bottle, which Kahlua accepted with a few noisy smacks. Barnette smiled at the sound.

"She's really a precious thing, you know," she said quietly. Rebecca beamed.

"Yes… I'm so proud of Ezra… imagine being stuck out in the middle of space, having a baby all on one's own… it must've been so hard on her… but look, now… we have a beautiful little daughter… I'm trying to train myself to be a good ohma now, so I'm letting Ezra sleep and I'm taking care of her instead…"

"…that's so wonderful…" Barnette muttered, almost drowsily. Rebecca eyed the pilot carefully.

"So… you can't be drinking yourself under the table for no good reason, now… care to talk?"

"I dunno… I've just made a hell of a lot of mistakes in my life, and now I'm regretting them all…"

"Like?"

"Like giving up the greatest love of my life… she doesn't deserve me. She deserves someone better… someone who will always be there, no matter what. Someone who won't change. She deserves to have a baby with someone who loves her back… who won't back down…"

"…Jura?"

Barnette nearly cried at the sound of her name… how it rolled off one's tongue. "Yes…"

Rebecca couldn't help but sit in silence, as Kahlua continued to suck noisily at the bottle.

"What… what happened to you two? You were inseparable when you left on the raid…"

Barnette uncapped the second flask and took a swig, sighing harshly at the initial burn of the liquor. "Well… Duero, that one guy… he found this old book in one of the sealed-off parts of the ship… it was a picture book on how babies were made back before the women and men separated… well, Jura got her hands on it, and she found the whole idea of being the first woman to have a man's baby entirely too intriguing… at first, I thought she was just needlessly obsessing over it… you know how Jura would do that every now and then… but then she just kept pressing at it… it sort of stung at first, but then I thought no… she can't mean it… she loves me, right? Then I made the mistake. You've heard how at one point we were fighting the enemy and Gascogne did a kamikaze to save my life, right? We thought she'd died in that… I mean, the loader went down in a ball of flames… there was no way she could have survived. So I kept thinking about it over and over… in my head… and I took over for her. During that time, I felt myself changing… I was losing that temper I'd always had… I was smiling more… I felt more in control of myself. But in doing that I lost touch with myself. I became completely engrossed as the Reg crew leader. I remember when Jura and Hibiki's combined Dread brought us back to Mejale's boundaries, I promised her I would cook for her when she got back… that made her so happy… and when it finally safe enough for the Nirvana to go on its own, she and Hibiki came back on board… and the first thing she did was fling herself at me… and you know what I did? I barely even received her… I held her, but it was so… so cold and stiff… I've never done that with her… and then, when Gascogne came back, I was allowed to return to being a Dread pilot again… but, you know, Jura just… she didn't say or do anything… and at first, I didn't think anything of it. I mean, we were in the heat of battle, and she had a hell of a lot more things on her mind to worry about over me coming back into the fray… but then, after it was over… she separated herself from me… I don't know where she went or who she was with… probably soaking up the glory and attention with Meia, Dita and Hibiki. I wouldn't blame her. How many times can you say you were famous? But… when Hibiki and the other men went back to Tarak… and she told them she wanted them to bring back some nice guys… I guess that sorta clinched it for me. I know I turned her off when I became the replacement Reg crew leader…"

"Do you?"

It was a simple, short question; regardless, Barnette nearly spat her drink across the bar in surprise. "What else could it have been?" she growled, slamming the flask down on the bar top. "I'm the one that caused all this! If I hadn't taken over, maybe she'd still want to have a baby with me instead of a guy! I have nothing against men now, but… but… God, Rebecca, _I love her so much…_ so _much…_"

Breaking down into harsh sobs, Barnette abandoned the flask, crying into her gloved hands. Skillfully balancing both Kahlua and the bottle in her crooked arm, Rebecca reached over and slung her free arm about the pilot's shoulders, drawing her close. Unabashedly Barnette wept, bitter tears mixing with the taste of the alcohol that still lingered in her mouth.

"Well, there's one thing I can tell you," Rebecca said softly. "Drinking yourself stupid isn't about to help anything. And ignoring Jura won't help, either. You must've talked with her once tonight, expressing how you felt… but did you ever think to ask her about her feelings?"

Barnette blushed with shame. "…no…"

"Then there's half of the problem right there. You claim to love Jura so much… but you know so little about love yourself. The first step to a successful relationship is making sure the lines of communication are open. I know, I know… that's a terrible cliché, but hear me out. Right now Jura must be hurting as badly as you are… do you think she'll be talking to anybody, or will she be curled up in her room, crying her eyes out?"

Barnette sat in silence, just gazing at little Kahlua, who had given up on the bottle and now snuggled closer into her ohma's arm. Rebecca continued.

"I'll bet if she had any problems she'd come running right to you… am I right?"

Barnette nodded.

"Well," Rebecca smiled, giving Barnette a gentle push, "then why don't you go seek her out and have a long talk? I'm sure that'd ease the tensions a lot…"

"I don't know if I can," Barnette muttered. "She most likely doesn't even want to see me now…"

"How do you know that, really?" Rebecca pestered. "She's probably aching to see you, but afraid to find you… she might be as afraid of seeing you as you are of her… somebody's got to initiate the contact, you know…"

"I know… but why me?" Barnette said with a helpless laugh. Rebecca gave her an extra squeeze.

"Because you need to show her you still love her… and that you haven't changed… and that you want to always be there for her… and hell, throw in the usual 'if I ever mistreat you again you have the full right to leave me, no questions asked,' routine. But most of all just to show her you… that's all."

Barnette leaned into Rebecca's hold, letting her tears flow freely. She knew what she said was true… but… it was just so hard…

"Well, listen. You think about what I said, and just take your time. I hate to leave you alone here, but I need to be getting little Kahlua back to bed. I know you'll do the right thing."

Rebecca paced to the doorway, and fingered the light switch. "Do you want me to leave this on, or…?"

"Turn it off," Barnette said quietly. "I like to think in the dark…"

Nodding, Rebecca turned the light off, leaving Barnette, once again, in the all-enveloping darkness.

~~~~~

_"It's all right… I won't bother you any more. But you'll always have a special place in my heart, Jura Basil Elden. You're the only woman to ever love me, as much as I loved you. I'm sorry I was so foolish as to throw that love away. Now you can find happiness that will be everlasting… goodbye, Jura…"_

Like a torturesome, broken record, Barnette's words cycled through Jura's brain, unending. Groaning, she dug her nails harder, harder into her hair, trying to tear out the confusion and sadness she felt…

She sat, curled in the smallest corner of her room, barricaded by a chair and desk, which she had pulled close to herself to seal her away from others who might come knocking.

_"I didn't want you to see how much I hurt… it hurt, you know? I caused you to pull away so much that… that you didn't want to be with me anymore. That you wanted to have a baby with someone else. Knowing that tortured me more than anything."_

"Barnette… Barnette, I'm so sorry… so goddamned sorry… please, don't go away… oh Barnette… don't leave me… I… I can't do anything without you… I'm not whole…"

Jura clenched her hands around her face, trying desperately to hold back the tears that wouldn't stop coming. Of course, neither would the _whys_ or _how comes_ that circled endlessly through her mind.

Why? Why had Barnette felt it necessary to leave? Of course, Jura cursed herself. She knew the reason. Ever since she'd found that damn book, she'd been pining endlessly to be the first woman ever to have a child by a man. But she never thought it would hurt Barnette so much…

"That's right… I never thought. I never do. I never use this goddamned brain…"

Now, more than anything in the world, Jura wanted Barnette back. In any shape or form… yes, she had felt a bit upset when Barnette had taken up the mantle of Reg crew leader and had, essentially become engrossed in her new job. But that didn't mean she had loved Jura any less. And it also didn't mean that Jura herself had loved Barnette any less.

"It was just my foolish, stupid fantasy… now I don't care who has a baby with a man first… if it means getting you back, I'll do anything…"

"Jura…"

In the midst of her sobbing, Jura hadn't even heard the door to her room open with a hydraulic hiss. Barnette stood in the doorway, her body framed by a glow coming from the hall lights. It was apparent she, too, had been crying; dark circles marred her beautiful violet eyes. She stood, hesitant to come in, her hand up against the frame of the door.

"Jura… you're in the corner…"

Jura looked up miserably. "Yeah… I felt like hiding away, and never coming out…"

Barnette lowered her gaze. "If it makes you feel any better, I felt like drinking myself into a coma… after what I said to you…"

Jura pushed the chair away with a foot. "You always had that drinking problem. But you shouldn't feel ashamed of what you said. You were right… I didn't have enough faith in you…"

"But… you had every right to do what you did," Barnette pressed quietly. "I wasn't paying enough attention to you… I was so busy with being the Reg leader, but… I never once forgot about you. If you ever got hurt again, like you did that one time… I could never forgive myself."

Jura patted the floor beside her, and, hesitantly, Barnette approached, eventually sitting next to her. They sat in silence, each gazing at the floor in front of them, afraid of glancing up and looking the other in the eye. The gentle ticking of an old-fashioned clock on Jura's bedside table was the only sound breaking the cloying silence that cushioned the room.

"…You know, I was sitting here, and remembering the day we first met…"

Barnette smiled. "Yeah… we couldn't stand each other then, remember?"

"Yeah… and once, you put hot pepper in my chicken salad… I almost drank the ship's water supply dry…"

"Yes… but then you got me back good… you took all my classic guns and hid them in the engine room… I went crazy looking for them…"

Jura smiled. "Those were the days…"

"Yeah… but, you know… I think I liked the loving a lot better than the fighting…"

"Yeah… me too…"

"…still do, actually…"

"…so do I…"

"You remember that promise we made? That no matter what happened, we'd always stick by each other?"

"Uh-huh…"

"Well… I think it still holds… don't you?"

Jura looked up, tears still glimmering gently in her eyes. "But I hurt you, Barnette-…"

Barnette pressed her finger to Jura's lips, silencing her. "And I hurt you… we hurt each other, but that's to be expected in a relationship. But what's most important is we never abandoned each other. I might've become engrossed in my work, but I never forgot you. And you might've felt jealous of me and upset, but you never forgot me, either… right?"

"No… I could never forget you… you brought me some of the happiest times in my life… how could I just forget you, huh?"

Barnette smiled. "So… can we safely say this never happened?"

Jura twined her fingers with Barnette's, and leaned her head on her shoulder. "I think so… tell me something, though, Barnette…"

"Mmm?"

"Will you love me… always?"

Barnette gripped Jura's hand, and gave her a light kiss on the forehead. "Always and forever… I will never leave you… I love you so much…"

"And… would you have my baby?"

"Me?" Barnette gulped. "I thought you were the one who wanted to have a baby!"

"Ehh," Jura waved a hand, "I'd gotten to thinking about it… and then I realized I'd be all messy-looking, and fat on top of things… I don't want to spoil my natural beauty, you know…"

"So you'd be more than willing to let me be the one who gets messy-looking and fat then?" Barnette joked. Jura poked her in the side.

"Oh no no no, you get me wrong, Barnette," Jura smiled. "I said _I'd_ look that way… _you'd_ look absolutely beautiful if you were to be the fahma… you'd be more cuddly than you already are!" She snuggled up next to Barnette upon saying this, and traced her fingers over Barnette's stomach. Barnette blushed.

"I don't know, though… I mean, of course I would… but… I dunno, it just scares me a little, I guess…"

"Don't worry," Jura whispered. "I'd always be with you… I'd do my best to make sure you were comfortable… I'd most certainly be there holding your hand when the time came… so you wouldn't be going it alone without any support, believe me…"

Barnette gave in with a happy sigh. "Well… since you make it sound that way, I guess I can't refuse…"

Jura turned her green eyes upon her beloved partner, seriousness entering her voice. "I know I always sounded juvenile and silly when I talked about having a baby before… like I never would take being a parent seriously… but if you had our baby… I would love her until the end of time. I wouldn't screw around… as much as I hate to say it, I'd have to change from being so flippant and carefree… but you know, I wouldn't mind it. Especially if I knew the baby was ours…"

"All right, all right," Barnette sighed, running her hands through Jura's hair. "As soon as we're able to, we'll go back to Mejale and see what we can do about having a baby together, alright?"

Jura squealed, and bowled Barnette over onto the floor in a fierce hug. "Oh, Barnette, I love you!"

Barnette beamed, letting Jura rest on top of her. "So do I, Jura…"

"Oh! Before I forget," Jura pushed herself up off the floor, and padded across her room to an elegant chest-of-drawers. She picked up a small, velvet-covered box, and touched at it lightly, as she walked back to Barnette.

"I realized that a kiss wasn't the best Christmas present I could have given you, especially after you gave me such a beautiful ring… so I picked one of my favorites to give to you. I hope it makes up for it…"

Gently, Barnette took the box in her hands, and flipped open the top. Inside sat a small golden ring, set with a rounded amethyst stone in the center, small polished diamonds circling it. Almost dumbly she fondled the ring between her fingers before Jura pinched it gently from her grasp and slid it onto her ring finger.

"There… I thought it matched your eyes… do you like it?"

"No… I love it… oh Jura," Barnette sighed, gazing at the ring from different angles, admiring the reflection of the light on its surface. "It's wonderful…"

"It was my mother's," Jura said, turning sideways to gaze out the picture window of her room. "She gave it to me just before I was sent away from our colony… I was only nine… but I remember she told me that it was a gift from the woman she loved… and that I should keep it and give it to someone special if I ever met them… so I figured now was as good a time as any… would you…"

She paused, gritting together all the courage she possessed. "Would… would you… would you become my partner for the rest of time, Barnette?"

She raised her hand, showing off the Christmas present that Barnette had given her so many months back. "I know I would…"

Silently, Barnette walked over to where Jura stood, and wrapped her arms around her shoulders, leaning into her back. "Of course… of course, Jura… yes…"

Gentle starlight enveloped the pair in its gauzy sheen, as they stared out the window, each content with the life they were about to press on with.

"However…"

"Yes?"

"…you still owe me a month's worth of cooking if Dita comes back pregnant with Hibiki's kid…"

Barnette giggled. "You're still on…"

~~~~~

Author's Finishing Notes: Okay, okay, that was terrible, wasn't it? Truckload of fluffly, but I couldn't help it… it needed to happen (for me, at least). If you didn't catch it, I'm a big sucker for dramatic romantic fluff, too… anyway, that was it. I am going to continue it, but for the moment I just wanted to make a one-shot with these two… the continuation will come in the form of a separate story because it will add other elements (in other words, not just dealing with Jura/Barnette but also other pairings I want to tinker with)… lemme know whatcha think, at speck@capital.net. I'm always friendly, if you need to know. ;) 


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